Rancho San Francisquito (Munras)

Rancho San Francisquito was a 8,813-acre (35.66 km²) Mexican land grant in present day Monterey County, California given in 1835 by Governor José Castro to Catalina Manzaneli de Munras.^[1] The grant was located in the upper Carmel Valley.^[2]

History

The two square league grant was made to Catalina Manzaneli de Munras who was the wife of Esteban Munras (1798–1850), a Monterey trader, amateur painter, and grantee of Rancho San Vicente. Catalina Manzanelli, the daughter of Maria Casilda Ponce De Leon and Nicolas Manzanelli, a silk merchant from Genoa, Italy, was also grantee of Rancho Laguna Seca.^{[3] [4]}

William Robert Garner(1803–1849), an English ex-whalerman, arrived in Santa Barbara in 1824, and in Monterey in 1828. In 1831, he married Antonia Francisca Butrón (1814–1883), one of the heirs to Rancho La Natividad. Garner began cutting lumber from the redwoods in the upper Carmel Valley. William Garner bought Rancho San Francisquito. He was killed by Indians in 1849.^[5]

José Abrego bought Rancho San Francisquito at the probate sale of the estate of William Robert Garner in 1853.^[6] José Abrego (1813–1877) came to Monterey in 1834, with the Hijar-Padres Colony. He was the administrator of Mission San Antonio in 1833 and 1834. In 1836, Abrego married Josefa Estrada (1814–), daughter of José Raimundo Estrada (1784–).^[7] In 1841 Maria Josefa Abrego bought Rancho San Jose y Sur Chiquito. José Abrego was the grantee of Rancho Punta de Pinos in 1844.

With the cession of California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim for Rancho San Francisquito was filed with the Public Land Commission in 1853,^[8] and the grant was patented to José Abrego in 1862.^[9]

In 1858 Bradley Sargent, who owned Rancho Potrero de San Carlos, also bought Rancho San Francisquito. Bradley Varnum Sargent (1828–1893), born in New Hampshire, came to California with his 3 brothers, Jacob L. Sargent (1818–1890), Roswell C. Sargent (1821–1903), and James P. Sargent (1823-1890) in 1849. In 1856 the Sargent brothers bought Rancho Juristac.

References

1. Ogden Hoffman, 1862, Reports of Land Cases Determined in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, Numa Hubert, San Francisco
2. Diseño del Rancho San Francisquito
3. Hoover, Mildred B.; Rensch, Hero; Rensch, Ethel; Abeloe, William N. (1966). Historic Spots in California. Stanford University Press. ISBN 978-0-8047-4482-9.
4. Luther A. Ingersoll,1893,Memorial and Biographical History of the Coast Counties of Central California, The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago.
5. William Robert Garner and Donald Munro Craig, 1970,Letters from California, 1846-1847, University of California Press, ISBN 978-0-520-01565-4
6. Donald Munro Craig, 1970, Letters From California, 1846-1847. William Robert Garner, University of California Press, Berkeley, California
7. Reminiscences of Mrs.Abrego Memorial And Biographical History Of The Coast Counties Of Central California, 1893, p.79
8. United States. District Court (California : Southern District) Land Case 247 SD
9. Report of the Surveyor General 1844 - 1886

Coordinates: 36°28′48″N 121°48′00″W / 36.480°N 121.800°W